Defining Feedback
In the course of a day we all give and receive feedback face-to-face or online, countless times, and within many different contexts, to and from family and friends, colleagues, acquaintances, and even strangers. What is feedback? Hattie and Timperley (2007:81), who explore the concept of feedback within the field of education and more specifically within the context of classrooms, state that feedback is âinformation provided by an agent (e.g., teacher, peer, book, parent, self, experience) regarding aspects of oneâs performance or understandingâ. That is a macro-perspective on feedback. A more micro-level perspective comes from Ramaprasad (1983) who has written widely in the area of feedback within management theory and who has been widely quoted in the literature in the field of education. His proposed definition of feedback refers to the âinformation about the gap between the actual level and the reference level of a system parameter which is used to alter the gap in some wayâ (1983:4). William (1998) has taken the concept further and argued that the uptake of feedback is evident only when the information about the gap has been used to address that gap; and Sadler (1998) noted that feedback should enable learners to recognise gaps between current and desired performance. The reference to âthe gapâ in Ramaprasadâs (1983) definition could easily be taken to indicate reference only to some form of corrective feedback that may signal that something was not quite right or something needs to be changed. Paradoxically, however, empirical evidence from my research study shows that this is not necessarily the case and that the gap could be one that involves âconfirmatoryâ feedback.
Kinds of Feedback
In my research into post-observation feedback I have made use of Eganâs work in counselling (1990, 2002) and have adopted his terminology. Egan divides feedback into two categories: confirmatory feedback and corrective feedback and states that âthrough confirmatory feedback, significant others such as helpers, relatives, friends, and colleagues let clients know that they are on courseâthat is moving successfully through the steps of their action programs toward their goalsâ and that âthrough corrective feedback, significant others let clients know that they have wandered off course and what they need to do to get back onâ (2002:361). He maintains that âfeedback is one way of providing both support and challengeâ (2002:360â361) and argues that clients would need to know how well they are performing if they are to be successful in implementing any action plans.
The definition of the terms corrective and confirmatory feedback have been adapted to suit the teacher education context in which the research study is situated. It is a context in which the people involved in giving or receiving the feedback are teacher educators or student teachers and are not in a counsellorâclient relationship. The terms were defined (see KurtoÄlu-Hooton 2004, 2008, 2010, 2016) as follows. Confirmatory feedback involves positive feedback in the form of praise, or confirmation and/or reassurance that something went well. This âsomethingâ can involve a teaching skill, a teacher quality, some teacher behaviour, or even a decision the teacher may have taken during teaching practice (TP). Corrective feedback, on the other hand, applies to situations where there was perhaps a better alternative for some skill that had been exhibited, for some behaviour that took place, for some teacher quality that was or was not revealed, or for some decision that did not work particularly well in a specific classroom context. In essence it acts as some form of âcorrectionâ while confirmatory feedback provides âa pat on the backâ.
For assessment purposes, to ensure that student teachers have fulfilled the aims and objectives of a teacher education course, certain behaviours are expected, and therefore feedback is often likely to be of a corrective nature. Corrective feedback, could, for example, focus on the need for student teachers to show their awareness of the learnersâ errors, the need for them to be able to correct these errors sensitively, or the need for them to ensure that any activity they use is purposeful. Student teachers might feel that this type of feedback also involves some kind of âa gentle telling offâ, especially if the feedback implies that there is very little or no evidence of progress.
The purpose of this book is to examine the intricacies of feedback, and in particular the confirmatory feedback that student teachers receive in group settings following TP. I will discuss the impact of feedback on student teacher learning as reported by the student teachers themselves; I also explore potential links between feedback and change through the introduction of the terms convergent change and divergent change. The book is also aimed to be of specific interest to teacher educators and other professionals involved in feedback-giving settings, in that it shares researcher experience in collecting and analysing feedback data.
My Research into Feedback
The empirical data discussed in this book come from the research that was conducted into post-observation feedback on two separate initial teacher training courses, Course A and Course B. The context is that of the post-observation feedback.
On teacher education courses and, in particular, on initial teacher training programmes, the student teacherâs process of becoming a more effective teacher is facilitated by the educator who creates the necessary conditions for learning via scaffolding. TP and the subsequent feedback on it (i.e. post-observation feedback) provide an ideal medium for this interaction.
TP is an essential element of such programmes (Sivan and Chan 2003:183; Bailey 2006; Copland 2008a, b). All teacher certification programmes in TESOL, such as the CELTA and the Trinity Cert TESOL, contain assessed teaching practice (Randall in Howard and Donaghue 2015:58), which is often taught in TP groups of three to four student teachers. The classes in each TP group are observed by a teacher educator, and the student teacherâs peers, who take it in turns to teach. TP is followed by a discussion session (i.e. post-observation feedback) in which the teachers give feedback to one another and receive feedback from their tutor as well as their peers.
The potential impact that this discussion may have on student teacher learning has always been intriguing for me. This curiosity led me to explore the following research questions in this study:
- 1.What does post-observation feedback contribute to student teacher learning?
- 2.What evidence of learning do student teachersâ self-reports reveal? What constitutes significant feedback for student teachers?
- 3.Do different kinds of feedback lead to different kinds of change in student teachersâ knowledge, understanding, and awareness of teaching?
The first set of data (i.e. from Course A) was analysed in the light of the first two research questions. The third question was added after the initial findings from this set of data and was used to analyse all the feedback data from Courses A and B.
Sociocultural Theories of Learning and Post-observation Feedback
The research study I report in this book is grounded in sociocultural theories of learning. Singh and Richards (2009:201) discuss perspectives inherent in such theories, stating that events and processes, and the way they interact, shape individualsâ thoughts, feelings, and behaviour. In discussing the relevance of sociocultural theories within the field of teacher education, they note that the classroom is âa site for social participation structures that can enhance or inhibit learning opportunityâ (ibid.:202).
The situated social perspective on learning is also reflected in the views promoted by Lave and Wenger who maintain that learning is a situated activity which has as its focal feature a process that they call âlegitimate peripheral participationâ (1991:29). This is defined as an analytical viewpoint on learning (1991:40), and a way of understanding learning, which is characterised by the fact that learning is âmediated by the d...